Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Bregman Subpoenas Susana

As he threatened to do two weeks ago, an Albuquerque lawyer has subpoenaed Gov. Susana Martinez in the wrongful termination case of the former boyfriend of Martinez's former secretary of the Corrections Department.

The subpoena, issued Friday, July 27 by administrative law Judge Leonard Padilla, commands Martinez to appear at the law office of Sam Bregman at 11 a.m. Sept. 10.

Bregman represents Larry Flynn, a state probation and parole supervisor who was fired in December, about three months after an incident in which he allegedly fired a gun outside of the home on state penitentiary grounds that he shared with then-Corrections Secretary Lupe Martinez — no relation to the governor.

Flynn told state police investigators that he was shooting at rattlesnakes. Flynn also had been investigated on allegations that he's padded his time card.

Flynn was improperly fired, Bregman argues, because the Governor’s Office improperly got involved in a personnel action against a classified state employee.

A spokesman for the governor said Tuesday that Gov. Martinez had not yet been served with the subpoena to testify, but had received a previous subpoena from Bregman to produce documents, including emails related to Flynn.

Asked whether Gov. Martinez would fight the subpoena to testify — and if so, if she'd invoke executive privilege — spokesman Scott Darnell said in an email, "We will examine that issue if/when it arises. Again, as we’ve said, this is an attorney’s latest ploy to focus on anything but Mr. Flynn’s own conduct as a state employee, which led to Secretary Marcantel’s disciplinary decision."

Gregg Marcantel was appointed to the job of Corrections secretary last year after Lupe Martinez left. Marcantel fired Flynn.

﻿Bregman is an Albuquerque-based Democratic Party activist who has been mentioned as a possible gubernatorial candidate. He has declined to comment on his possible candidacy.

Also issued subpoenas Friday were Martinez's chief of staff Keith Gardner, deputy chief of staff Ryan Cangiolosi and State Police Chief Robert Shilling.

Judge Padilla ruled last month that Gardner, will have to answer questions about Flynn’s firing. The Governor’s Office had tried to quash that subpoena, claiming executive privilege. However, Padilla said Gardner wasn't protected by executive privilege.

Bregman postponed Gardner's deposition after he obtained an email sent to Martinez regarding Flynn.

The email in question is from Cangiolosi, sent from his Yahoo account to Martinez, at her susana2010.com address and copied to Gardner at his Gmail account. The email is dated Sept. 5 — two days after Lupe Martinez abruptly resigned from her $106,000-a-year job and less than two months before Flynn was charged by state police with two misdemeanors related to the shooting incident. Both charges later were dropped.

“Governor, Please see the attached document brief on Larry Flynn,” Cangiolosi wrote. Attached was a memo from Rosa Manning of the State Police Criminal Investigations Division to Chief Shilling, stating, “Per your request, investigative research was conducted on Larry E. Flynn ...” The report lists other personal information on Flynn, including court cases involving Flynn, vehicle registrations and links to news stories about him on the Internet.

Martinez has vehemently denied she ever received Cangiolosi's email. She and others in the administration have said all of Martinez's 2010 campaign emails accounts have been defunct since the middle of last year.